Question
I've recently read "The Well-Behaved Child" and have decided to implement the ticket system with both my 5 and 6 yo. I was doing a watered down version of this system already with what I called "long time outs" - in their room in time out for 2 hours (usally after coming home from school with a bad behavior report, so 5 yo would be in her room from then until dinner getting no outside playtime, etc.)
My question is centered at the point where the child loses all tickets and then must be in her room until bedtime. Her room is already "santized" of all fun things except for necessary items. When I was using my "long time outs" she had to sit still as if in time out - no playing, no talking, nothing. Now when she had lost all her tickets, my 5 yo is going into her and sitting, following what I had previously inacted with my long time outs. Also, when I over-rode the system for serious bad behavior with a sitter and she spent the whole next day in her room, she again sat still following my previous instructions for the long time outs.
One might ask why I'm questioning this...except that long of a time in her room doing absolutely nothing leads this clever, defiant 5 yo to find ways to occupy her time - like licking every bit of her exposed skin, spitting in her hand and wiping it on her bed or the carpet, picking up lint and hair from the floor and eating it, picking at a string on her sock and pulling it to unravel her sock, climbing up and down the stairs to the upper bunk bed, and even trying to sneak out of her room when she thinks we are in another part of the house.
So, my question is...is the isolation in the room to be like a timeout, or just "banished" to the room to do whatever she likes in there? Is there something I should put in the room to keep her occupied, or leave her to her own devices? Do I give her another day in her room for leaving it, spitting, licking everything, or just ignore it? Also, the 6 and 5 yo share a room and when both have lost all tickets or had a system over-ride, can I put them together or find separate spaces for them?
